Hello I’m new to this diet, been doing it for a month now and lost 9lb but starting to need some support
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Absolutely Mrs G!!!! That’s the whole point – and the beauty – of 5:2. You fast for 2 days and on the other 5 you eat what you like. WHAT you like NOT how much you like! That means whatever foods you like AS LONG AS YOU STAY BELOW YOUR TDEE.
You can eat chocolate, but by the square not by the bar. If you are not sure about your TDEE there is a link in the right hand column >>>>>> where you can check it out. If you’re not sure if you are staying under it then for even just a couple of weeks you could use an app like http://www.myfitnesspal.com where you can keep track of the food you have eaten and it’s calorie value. A set of kitchen scales is also useful for these weeks. It’s definitely worth doing this so you can get an idea of portion size as everyone tends to under-estimate the calories and portion sizes they are eating.
Hope this helps….good luck
Sylvestra is spot on! If you do 5:2 you got to stay within your TDE. If you did alternate day fasting you could eat not only what you like but also how much you like.
I am playing around with the number of days I fast. Around xmas for instance there is a good chance that I do 4:3 or alternate fasting to compensate for the over-indulging. I do not want to ruin all the “hard” work that I put in for the last 5 weeks.
Stef.
Stef – I have to question ‘if you do 4:3 you can eat as much as you like on non fast days’. It seems rather self defeating.
I know that as we progress with this WOE the amount we eat on non fast days tends to reduce and we don’t ‘go mad’ with food.
I feel though that for anyone just starting this advice is misleading.
If, for example, someone has a TDEE of 2000. They will eat 500 cals 3 times a week but could easily be eating 3000 or more cals on the other 4 – more or less cancelling out the fast days.
I haven’t seen the ‘eat as much as you like’ principle in any of the books I’ve read on this WOE.
Can you tell me where you read this, please? I must have missed it somewhere.
On page 30 of his book he explains the alternate day fasting diet and 4:3 is pretty close to that. And there he says that in trials it has been shown that people usually do not go over 110% of what they are usually eating on the non fast days. This has to do with stomach size.
Also see page 106/107: “You could pig out on your non fast days, working your way staedily through all the ice cream flavors in the freezer (even if you did, you’d still get some of the metabolic benefits of fasting). But you won’t do that. In all likelihood you will remain gently…attentive to your calorie intake, almost without noticing. …So yes eat freely, forbig nothing, but trust your body to say “when”.
Page 106: The Illinois study certainly found that vonlunteers encouraged to eat lasagna, pizza and fries during off days still lost weight.
… a calorie slash of 75% on a fast day generally gives rise to little more than a 15% increase on the following feed day.
Nevertheless, Sylvestra, I agree it might be misleading, eventhough it is pretty hard to make up for the 4500 calories that you have not consumed during the remaining 4 days of the week, considering you do eat half way healthy.
Stef.
That’s the point though Stef….lots of people come to the 5:2 BECAUSE they haven’t been eating healthy foods and BECAUSE they’ve been eating too much.
If someone is overweight because they eat too much it would be very easy for them to continue to so this and eat the extra 4500 calories. It takes time for the stomach to accept smaller amounts of food and to get to the point where it will not accept too much.
If you look at the ‘why fast’ link at the top of this page, Michael Mosley says ‘Success also depends on not over-eating on your normal days’.
I just feel that telling a newcomer to fasting that they can eat as much as they like on non fast days, on 4:3, ADF or any other variation is very misleading and could lead to disappointment for them.
Scientific studies are fine but people are people. We all take what we want from the various books.
However, I’m not going to get into an argument about this – life’s too short.
Point taken. You are absolutely right and I should not say this.
The reason why I’m doing it is that a lot of people are saying you can eat what you want. I then reply that you can’t, that you have to stay with in your TDE, apart from if you were to go on alternate fasting or 4:3.
But again, this is indeed misleading as you should not really over-indulge with any form of fasting.
My bad-apologies!
Stef.
Just fell over Michael’s response that let me believe that you can eat how much and what you want when you are on the 4:3 or alternating fast:
http://thefastdiet.co.uk/forums/users/michael/replies/
Here he says:
“Hi Lauarab, doing an extra fast day is absolutely fine. Some of the best research on the benefits of intermittent fasting have come from ADF, alternate day fasting, which means 3.5 days a week. With ADF you are allowed to eat freely on non fast day. An alternative approach would be 3 days a week. Don’t go beyond what feels comfortable otherwise you may just get out of doing it at all”
Personally, this is for me of particular interest as I know that over the xmas period there is a good chance that I will not stick to my TDE of 1700 kcal. I hope that if I then compensate by doing a fast day every second day I will not ruin my weight loss.
Stef.
Comfortable is key. I don’t want to eat all I could on feed days, as by now my capacity is less and so over eating is just uncomfortable. And re-education means that I am always aware that I am over doing it, so generally I want to put the brakes on.
My experience is that an every now and then over indulgence on a feed day has no effect, but over doing it on feed days for a week or more does result in a slight weight gain – which is fortunately stupidly easy to get rid of 🙂
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10 Dec 13